My Girl 2 (1994)

This film was rather heartwarming whereas the original was more heartbreaking. As much as I loved the original, this film isn't as emotionally hard hitting for young children.

People keep rating this movie as bad because they compare it with the original. I've watched this movie as a teen and absolutely loved it! As a child, you do not have such expectation that it should be as great or "deep" as the first movie, and that's maybe why I love it. I liked the original My Girl, but I loved this sequel more. It's heartwarming, simple, and had great 70s songs in it + the very nicely sung "Smile" by Vada's mom. My Girl 2 actually made me fall in love with 70s fashion and music. You can watch this movie even without watching the first. As some say, it can stand alone. I connected more with Vada in this movie than the first. The movie is very personal that you feel Vada is you or your best friend.

Okay I have seen the sequel to my Girl quite easily one of my favourite coming of age films. I had 2 expectations with this one, either "cash cow" or "they're trying". My opinion is the latter.The plot is that for a school assignment Vada has to write about someone she's never met and must write their crowning achievement. She decides to write about her mother who died giving birth to her and through circumstances she stays with her uncle Phil in Los Angeles over her summer vacation to find all of this out.The acting from Anna Chlumsky as usual is very much worth it as is from most of the main players in this movie. if there was any complaint with it I think it might be this Nick character who they put in a little bit of a contrived love relationship with Vada.I guess people might want to know is it better than the first one? No. But then again it is worth it if you've seen the first one. The characters are pretty much the same as in the first one and they still feel like real people like in the first one. It doesn't throw me on the same emotional level as the first one but it is somewhat still there. If you liked the first one, check it out.

I've seen this movie several times, and read the other comments to see if another viewer would enlighten me as to why this movie was so "bad", but the negative reviewers were hard-pressed to find specific examples -- all people said was "it's a sequel, so it's pointless, they shouldn't have made it, THEREFORE it must be bad." If you ask me, that's definitely jumping to conclusions; it's very easy to write a review like that without ever having seen the movie at all.What's interesting about this movie is, while it is a sequel, unlike most sequels, it just as easily could stand on its own -- viewers need not have seen My Girl before seeing My Girl 2. The setting is, for the most part, completely different (from funeral home in Pennsylvania to sunny California). Vada's character, which, in the first movie, had been a neurotic hypochondriac, has "recovered" and now is more or less a normal teenager. Shelley (Jamie Lee Curtis) has been accepted into the family and is now just a loving stepmother -- and she plays a minor role in the film, anyway, as most of the film concerns Vada away from home -- and thus an entirely different cast of new characters were introduced. Instead of looking at this film as a sequel, one could easily see it as a 13-year-old girl attempting to find out more about the mother she never knew. I wouldn't exactly call that contrived, and the movie didn't incessantly "repeat" themes or jokes (or make more than a reference or two) to the first movie.*SOME SPOILERS*What I came away with, though, was that the story line didn't feel strong enough to sustain the movie. Yes, it was enjoyable, but there weren't a lot of twists and turns to move the main story forward -- a lot of the major points of conflict were found in the subplots, actually -- the relationship between Vada's uncle (who makes a cameo in the first movie, and whose character is expanded here) and his fiancée; the relationship between Vada and Nick (which is slightly disturbing considering he's going to be her cousin); the news of Shelley's pregnancy, etc. The bulk of the main story, after Vada arrives in California, consists of her talking to people somewhat matter-of-factly; she never really hits any "dead ends" or runs into any problems until near the end when Vada finds out about her mother's first husband. For some reason, though, that doesn't feel much like a satisfying climax, because nothing really built up to it or "prepared" the audience for it. On the other hand, the following scene, where Vada gets to "see" her mother for the first time (on film), really arouses the sentimental pathos so characteristic of the first movie. However, I wonder what is implied by the final scene -- where Vada flies home to be with her father and Shelley and the new baby and sings the song her mother sang in the film -- is it saying that although Vada grew up without a mother, she can play "mother" to this child? But the child already has a mother (and not Vada's mother). There is no real coming-of-age in this movie, either, as might be expected in a film with a thin plot -- possibly because Vada is pretty sane in this film, and there aren't many more of her values one can alter.Somehow, overall, the film manages to come off as enjoyable, though, if maybe just for the audience's curiosity about the mysterious half of Vada's family she knew little about. I can't quite classify it as a "good film", but even with all the little things I listed above I can't exactly classify it as a "bad" film, either. It follows a different sort of formula than the first movie, so I don't even feel like seeing if it measures up to the original is a fair point of comparison. It's different -- let's just leave it at that.